1. Field of Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus and a method for determining a short-term driving tendency of a vehicle driver, and more particularly, to an apparatus and a method for determining a short-term driving tendency of a vehicle driver, which restricts determination of the short-term driving tendency in a running condition in which it is impossible to accurately determine the short-term driving tendency.
2. Description of Related Art
In general, drivers, who drive vehicles, have different and various driving tendencies, respectively. For example, like a driver who drives a vehicle at a high average running speed, a driver using low acceleration and deceleration characteristics compared to other drivers, a driver who performs fuel-efficient driving, or a driver who drives a vehicle over a long distance on a highway mainly on weekends, drivers may have the many different driving tendencies.
Satisfaction of customers regarding running performance of a vehicle depends on how the vehicle runs and coincides with a driving tendency of the driver, but because the premade vehicles generally have predetermined uniform performance characteristics, there is a drawback in that various driving tendencies of the customers are not reflected. Therefore, in recent years, researches on vehicle control technologies based on a driving tendency of the driver, which recognizes the driving tendency of the driver and allows the vehicle to respond suitably to the driving tendency of the driver, are being actively conducted.
In order to provide the vehicle control technology based on the driving tendency of the driver, first, it is very important to accurately determine the driving tendency of the driver. Meanwhile, in the related art, in order to determine an acceleration driving tendency of the driver, a method of calculating the driving tendency of the driver by utilizing a specific condition (for example, an accelerator pedal opening degree and a change rate of the accelerator pedal opening degree) has been developed.
However, in the related art, in the method of calculating the driving tendency, well matching results are obtained in a case in which there is no obstacle in front of the vehicle that is being driven, but there is a problem in that it is impossible to recognize an acceleration tendency of the driver in a case in which the vehicle coasts (the vehicle runs by inertia in a state in which a transmission is placed at a neutral position) on a congested and jammed road in a state in which the driver does not step on the accelerator pedal or in a case in which the driver rather decelerates the vehicle.
In addition, in a case in which the calculation of the tendency of the driver is continuously performed in this situation, since the tendency is moved toward a mild tendency regardless of the actual tendency of the driver and an inaccurate tendency determination numeric value is obtained, there is a problem in that reliability deteriorates.
Therefore, in order to provide the vehicle control technology based on the driving tendency, which shows high reliability and satisfaction of the customers, a method capable of more accurately determining the driving tendency of the driver is required.
The information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the general background of the invention and should not be taken as an acknowledgement or any form of suggestion that this information forms the prior art already known to a person skilled in the art.